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Becoming the Anxiety

Not being adept at the German language, I am finding a lot of time to paint and sit in silence these days. I especially appreciate listening to the endless songs of the swallows here in Eschersleben. I also spend many hours painting and it seems to do something to my awareness that I am not sure about at this time. I just know that I am more attuned to the world around; focused on the noises, smell, nature and sensations around me. In that place I am really beginning to see and catch how my thoughts unconsciously go to anxious themes. I am much more ready to embrace and release that energy. There was a long period of time, (years ) where that awareness of the anxiety was immense. It seemed to reach a point that it dominated. Its origins were somewhat unconscious to me. I suspect that it was more that I was finally ready to face the chronic suppressed anxiety that was underlying my shaky identity. All of this is more conscious these days, at least for now.
Expressing this experience of life and living is easier in painting. It seems to be rather spontaneous and not ot the will. Using words to express it can not be done without considering the role of awareness and sitting in silence. Out of that I have realized the relationship between suffering and the delusive sense of self. Another relevent insight is that the way that I experience the world affects whether I experience suffering or not. My perception of time has a big impact coming to see that there exists a relationship between feeling that I am living authentically and the way that I experience time. Our conditioned world has encouraged a temporal relationship to time. Awareness of that relation has revealed that the consequence of that is identitying with the subject or ego consciousness. That ego is in fact quite lacking in the experience and awareness of life and is perpetuated by the creation of a duality between consciousness and object. In this way, thinking as the thinker is in an ongoing place distinguishing one pole (e.g., success) from its opposite (failure) in order to attain the first and reject the other, but that bifurcation does not work because the two terms are interdependent.In that duality there is an endless cycle of focus on thoughts of security or relief from existential anxiety that is itself a consequence of this dualistic thinking. That pursuit is itself a process of bifurcation.
These days I am discovering another way of relating to that anxiety, encouraged by investigation in silence and that is not to evade it but to “become it” and see what comes from that. It seems that It is a part of me that cannot be fixed, cured or denied. Embracing the split that the mind has created seems to be a more authentic response that allows for a more comprehensive and holistic exploration and embracing of self. That experience is beyond what words or a dualistic way can capture or comprehend.

IRIS PHOTOGRAPHS

So we have to understand the existence, this life, our relationship to society. We have not only to understand our relationship with each other, with society, but to bring about a radical change in that relationship. And that is our responsibility. I do not think we feel this urgency. – Krishnamurti